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Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki complains, bitterly, that denying him another term in power will take the country “into a dark tunnel.” Legally speaking, he has a point. He led a Shia coalition that won the recent election by a convincing margin. That should have assured him the first kick at forming a new government.

But al-Maliki’s divisive, sectarian politics is wrecking Iraq, taking it down a road to ruin where the darkness will be permanent. Iraq’s 33 million people urgently need better leadership than he can offer. Under the dire circumstances President Fouad Massoum is right to offer a less divisive Shia leader, Haider al-Abadi, a member of al-Maliki’s Dawa party, a chance to form a new government and rally the nation.

As the political and military crisis has deepened, the Iraqi National Alliance, a broad coalition of Shia parties that backed al-Maliki in the April elections, has openly repudiated him and endorsed al-Abadi. Powerful Shia clerics have also signalled that al-Maliki must go. They now recognize the need for a prime minister who can reach out to Sunnis and Kurds to prevent Iraq’s political collapse under the pressure of an onslaught from the extremists of the Islamic State movement. At a time when Iraq has no good options, this side-stepping of constitutional niceties may prove the least bad one.

U.S. President Barack Obama has long since given up on al-Maliki. Washington backs Massoum’s bid to install someone capable of “building a national consensus and governing in an inclusive manner.” Meanwhile Obama has ordered airstrikes on the Islamic State fighters who have overrun much of Iraq and Syria, and has begun to arm the Kurds directly. Washington has a strategic interest in averting Iraq’s collapse and protecting its Kurdish allies, and a humanitarian interest in thwarting the slaughter of minorities.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government, in turn, has rightly stepped up aid, adding $5 million to the $16 million already pledged to Iraq this year to supply refugees from the fighting with food, water, medical care and shelter.

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Little wonder that support for al-Maliki has bled away, even in Shia quarters. On his inept watch the Islamic State militants —a Sunni Iraqi offshoot of Al Qaeda that cut their teeth fighting Bashar Assad’s regime in Syria— have multiplied like a plague, feeding on Sunni discontent.

They have declared an Islamic “caliphate” in much of Iraq and Syria. In Iraq they have seized Mosul, the second-largest city and captured the strategic Mosul Dam. They threaten Irbil, the seat of Kurdish government, and are terrorizing and murdering Christians and Yazidis huddled on Mount Sinjar with little more than the clothes on their backs. The risk of Iraq disintegrating is real.

All this time Iraq’s political crisis has paralyzed the country. Al-Maliki hails from the 17-million Shia majority and has ruled since 2006. But after the American military pullout in 2011, he adopted a winner-take-all approach and foolishly reneged on power-sharing deals the Americans had brokered with the country’s 9 million Sunnis to win their loyalty after sectarian strife early on al-Maliki’s watch. The Kurds, who number 6 million, are autonomous.

Al-Maliki concentrated power in his own hands, including control of the army, intelligence services and police. He favoured Shias, shunting once-dominant Sunnis to the political sidelines. And he ignored Sunni regional demands for better services. All this fed Sunni alienation and led some to throw in their lot with the jihadis.

Messy as Iraq’s political transition is bound to be, the country needs a prime minister who can resist playing the sectarian card, is prepared to build Shia-Sunni coalitions, and will share political power and the nation’s vast oil wealth. Al-Maliki may complain that he has been shortchanged. But Iraqis have suffered under his benighted leadership. It’s time for a new direction.

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